more live rock questions...

[lando]

Okay, so I just ordered 25 lbs of keys rock from liverocks.com. I spoke with Mike who was super-cool and a huge help. I do have a few questions. Mike said I do not need to cure the LR, i can just dump it in the tank with no problems. Has anyone else done this with LR from there? I do have 80 lbs in already and 30 lbs LR rubble in sump. Total system water is just over 90 gal. Also, I was told not to do a hypo-dip to drive out hitchhikers. they are apparenly not too much of a problem in the keys rock. Any thoughts? Tomorrow might just be better then Christmas. (Just kidding, Rev! ) Thanks! Lando

[lziarek]

I did not do a hypo dip, i have 80lbs of keys rock. I also placed it into my aquarium as suggested and so far so good =). Everything is growing amazingly well and I do have a few "bad" crabs but they seem to be doing just fine.

[SamIAm]

Great rock. I put it into the tank without curing and had no problem. However, I did do the hypo dip. Out popped a mantis shrimp. I later discovered a mithrax crab, which did not come out during the hypo dip. He's now residing in my sump.

[malkore]

If you have no fish in the tank yet, then I'd add it without a dip or any special curing.
when I got my 40lbs of LR, I added it immediately. Never had any ammonia, or nitrite..and within a week I had small levels of nitrate (by this time i'd added some crabs, and had been tossing in a sinking hikari wafer to keep them fed/produce ammonia)
They ship it as perfectly as you can ship live rock, and since it's rock they're culturing, it's fresh from large holding pools.

[ellisz]

I added my LR.com straight to the tank as well. I had a tiny ammonia spike but nothing my fish, inverts and corals did not handle.

I have removed a lot of crabs, predator snails and 1 mantis though. When I moved my tank, I FW dipped all of my rock to get the unwanteds out. This was after all the rock had been in the tank a few months.

If you want the critters out, I would cure it. If you want them, stick it right in. Make sure the smell is good though. Mine smelled just like the ocean

[Nitrate]

I added 100 lbs the same day it arrived, no problems.

[dralarms]

With the amount of lr and stuff you already have then adding it directly to the tank will be ok. Sounds like you have enough to take care of the small amount of die off there will be. Just watch your levels daily for about a week, and be ready to do some massive water changes if necessary.